The Diary of Grace McCormack
by Shadowz
Summary: Grace McCormack is a sixteen year old living in Galway, Ireland. She is quite worried at the moment. Her father is angry, and her mother is grieving, and it is all because her callow older brother Angelus didn't return home from the inn last night...


A/N: When Angel said he killed all his family and friends with 'a song in my heart', I wondered   
what it was like for them. Apart from painful when they were eaten. So then I made up his sister,  
Grace, who is sixteen and wants to know just why her older brother has gone missing...  
Disclaimer: If you are Joss Whedon, then I think the show is brilliant, and that is why I am   
using these fantastic characters when I have no claim to them, apart from the ones I made up. So   
there!!! ;-P  
A/N2:Do we actually know Angel's last name? Cause I haven't seen many episodes, so I wouldn't   
know. I don't think we do, that's why I made it up. Sozz if I'm wrong.  
  
Setting: Galway, Ireland, 1753.  
  
The Diary of Grace McCormack.  
  
18th October 1753.  
  
Father is vexed. Angelus did not return home last night, and nobody has seen him since   
he left the tavern late last night. He says this is the last straw, that Angelus should behave   
more like the gentleman he is than some callow, reckless lad.   
Mother has wept since dawn at least, leaving me to care for the younger ones. She keeps   
on that my brother may have been attacked by bandits, or killed, or worse. Father shouted at her   
when she suggested this first, telling her Angelus could easily fight, and maybe he was hiding   
because he had attacked somebody. This just made her sob harder, and made Father shout louder.  
I feel sorry for Mother-she does not see what a wretch Angelus acts like. Eventually,   
Father calmed enough to let her sit in the back room crying alone. He told me later on to watch   
over Phyllis, Jane, and Patrick whilst he left to search for my brother. Before he went, he vowed   
to make Angelus pay dearly for upsetting Mother.  
That was two hours past, and he still has not returned. I worry for his safety, and also   
for Angelus's, because lately there have been tales of horrific deaths that leave the person with  
two open wounds on the neck. Vampires, some say. I don't know what to believe.  
  
19th October 1753.  
  
Father returned from a pointless search of Galway last night, in a worse mood than the   
one he had been in when he left. He checked the inns, he checked the hovels, he checked the   
houses of all of my brother's friends-for nothing. Angelus is in none of these places.  
Mother is silent for most of the time now, staring out of the window as if thinking to   
see Angelus walking down the street. Every so often, she breaks into whimpers or more tears. I   
have to keep my younger sisters and brother from seeing her in such a state, as they would worry   
more.  
As I set out lunch, Father told me of what had happened at the house of David, the friend  
Angelus went to the local tavern with two nights since.  
"The drunkard told me he had seen nothing of Angelus since they left the inn the night   
he disappeared." Father growled. "Says all he can remember is Angelus walking away to a small   
figure in the alley nearby."  
Father also says that he thinks Angelus may have left to fulfil his 'foolish notion of   
travelling the world'. On Mother's only coherent words of today, a request, he has just left for   
another search of the town. I said nothing as I saw him leave, armed with a dagger under his   
coat.  
  
20th October 1753.  
  
Horrible! Horrible! Of all the terrible ghastly tragedies!  
Father has been found dead in the streets, not far from where David saw Angelus last.   
They discovered his body as the sun rose above Galway and the men started out for work.  
When they told us, Mother buried her head in her hands, and the little ones started to   
wail pitifully, clinging to her. The man who had first spotted dear Father's body told me that   
there were duplicate holes in his neck with blood dripping from them. He then handed me a scrap   
of brown parchment that had been found by the body.  
I shook when I saw the black letters in my brother's handwriting.  
YOU CANNOT RUN. YOU CANNOT HIDE.  
When I showed it to Mother apprehensively, she shrieked with grief and ran from the room.  
I wouldn't tell the little ones what it said, just told them to hurry to bed and pray for Angelus  
and Father's soul.  
Why is this happening to us?  
  
21st October 1753.  
  
More ill fated deaths!  
Last night, three of Angelus's friends, including David, were killed in the same   
circumstances as Father. Each bared the neck wounds, and each bared a message, written on the   
wall in their own blood. David's mother told me what it had said.  
ALL SHALL DIE.  
Those three words were in my brother's hand. I know for I arrived at David's house to   
offer my condolences, they were scrubbing the words away from the wall.  
Mother is inconsolable. I feel so helpless, seeing the torment she is in. Her husband is   
dead, and it seems to be at the hands of her son.  
At first, I was so certain it was a hoax. Surely Angelus was innocent for once. My   
brother may be a rogue and a scoundrel, but he is not a heartless murderer.  
But as time goes on, as I see what has happened in the past few days, I become less and   
less sure of it every second.  
At night, when the little ones are asleep and Mother is dozing fitfully, when I lay deep   
down in my bed, I weep as well for what used to be.  
  
22nd October 1753.  
  
Father's funeral was held today in the Galway churchyard. Few arrived in this miserable   
weather-there were a few of his work friends, myself, Jane, Patrick, Phyllis, and Mother, aside   
from the priest. I could barely concentrate on the sermon he was droning into the wind and rain   
for my own dark thoughts.  
Where was my wretched brother? I felt-and still do feel- terribly furious at the display   
he has made of lack of feelings. He didn't even show up at the funeral of his friends after   
Father's. I would have attended, but I had to take Mother home to rest. She has refused food   
since Father died, and when we got back she collapsed, exhausted physically, emtionally, and   
mentally.   
I really don't know where I find the strength to look after my siblings and Mother.Even   
when I was little, Angelus used to pull my plait, and laugh about how serious I was. I felt a bit  
envious, unfortunately, that he could always have something to laugh about.  
Now I know that perhaps it is better to be serious than a conscienceless fool like my   
brother.  
  
22nd October 1753.  
  
How can so many tragedies occur in just five days?  
If this page in my journal is tear-stained and the ink smudged, you must be gracious   
enough to excuse me on account of the bitter tears that fall from my eyes.  
Today we received news that the families of Angelus's friends were all slain. How can   
this be? Just yesterday they buried their dead, and now today they join them in heaven with the   
Lord.  
Mother is past tears now. Her sorrow is so deep that she merely sits staring out of the   
window. She cannot hear Jane's planitive voice, cannot see Patrick's childish gifts for her,   
cannot reply to Phyllis's conversation. She cannot see that we are grieving too, and how hard   
I try to make things better.  
If only Angelus were here to help! Although we had our differences, I still loved him   
as my brother and still knew that, somewhere very deep down inside of him, there was a good and   
caring person, however much it got swallowed up by the immature man we witnessed constantly.  
When I had checked on Mother in the back room, I put on my shawl and spoke to the   
children.  
"Patrick, you are the eldest," I told him. "You must look after Phylly and Jane, and   
Mother. I'm going to be at the church for a while. Will you be good and please do what I ask?"  
"Yes!" he said eagerly. I smiled. He is a good boy, very unlike Angelus, even though he   
is only nine.   
What I didn't tell him was that I was going to pray for everything to turn alright, and   
for Angelus to come back home in the midst of tonights storm.  
  
23rd October 1753.  
  
My prayers were for naught. I returned home to find that I am almost alone in the world.  
When I returned to my darkened home close to midnight, I found Mother was up and sitting   
in her rocking chair by a dead fire. She was wearing a shawl, so I didn't worry about how cold   
she would be, and put her paleness down to lack of food. It was good to see her so peaceful. The   
children I could not find until I checked the bedroom. Phyllis and Jane were in their bed and   
Patrick in his, all pale and serene.   
Too serene...  
Patrick always moves a lot in his sleep. Always. And none of the children pulled the   
blankets up to their chins like that.   
I strode over and pulled back the blanket on my brother's bed. And gave a horrified gasp   
as I saw the gaping gashes in his neck leaking the last of his lifeblood onto the sheets.   
Terrified and trembling, I slowly pulled back the covers of my sisters' bed and found them in   
exactly the same condition.  
Shrieking, I ran back to Mother and took her cold wrist from her lap and shook it hard.   
She did not wake, her head remained bowed. I lifted it towards my face, and screamed shrilly as   
I saw her mouth contorted in pain and her eyes rolled back in her head. I whipped away the shawl   
and it fell to the flagstone floor as I stared at the bite in her neck.  
Lightning from the storm flashed and illuminated the room and the writing on the wall.   
The words Angelus had scrawled in the blood of our family.  
BROTHERLY LOVE AS ALWAYS, GRACEY.  
Gracey. He has not called me that since we were small, or since he pleaded last for a   
favour. It brought back memories, painful memories of happier times.   
That was why I fled sobbing into the street.  
  
25th October 1753.  
  
All throughout Galway, Angelus is wanted for murder. Murder of his friends and their   
families, and his own family. People jeer and spit at me on the streets, or stare in silent   
sympathy as I try to go about my business.   
Today I buried my sisters and brother and mother, just three days after I buried my   
father. Is it really only a week since Angelus had disappeared and Father was angrily cursing   
him? It seems like an eternity.  
I ask what sins I have committed that such a torture be placed upon my head. I have tried   
hard to live a good life, much harder than Angelus ever has. I pray that the Lord God forgive me   
for whatever it is I have done, and let me know what price redemption can be achieved by.  
I spend most of my time confessing my sins or praying at the church, as being in my   
silent home reminds me of my evil and how it has taken my loved ones away.  
  
26th October 1753.  
  
When I returned home today, I found a dead woman lying in my home, left obviously by   
Angelus. I recognised her as a street walker who goes by the name of Annie, and knew that she   
used to mix with Angelus's circle of friends a lot. I sank to the floor and laughed wildly. I   
cannot cry any more-my angst is past that. Her neck was marked by the two holes, her skin was   
pale and bloodless-for her blood was smeared in yet another message on the wall. It read, in my   
brother's hand:  
I BEG YOUR FORGIVENESS, MEET ME ON THE HILL AT MIDNIGHT.  
How can he want my forgiveness if he kills like this? And yet, I know I must go, for I   
want to- and must- ask him why. Why Father? Why Mother? Why Jane, why Patrick, why Phyllis? Why   
David and his other friends and their families? Why Annie?  
Something about those words though was pleading. Angelus, my dear brother, had written   
them, not the brutal beast he was charading as. I know they were written with his soul. I have   
made too many mistakes in my sixteen years in God's land, and that is why these people have died.   
And that is why I shall go to the hill just outside Galway, Ireland, at midnight tonight   
to confront and maybe help my brother.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Historical Note.  
  
The body of Grace Eliza McCormack was discovered on Miner's Hill just outside the Irish   
town of Galway at dawn on the 27th October 1753 lying in a pool of blood. The cause of her death   
remains a mystery, although it is reported that she sustained two wounds to the neck and that   
most of her blood was forming the pool around her. The rest was gone. We can tell from church   
records that Grace, who was just sixteen, had recently been orphaned and all her family killed,   
so suicide was the verdict. She was laid to rest three days later in the Galway churchyard with   
the rest of her family.  
Angelus McCormack was never found, although a man with the same first name did arrive a   
week later in Liverpool, England, after a trip from Ireland with his lover, Darla...   
  
  



End file.
